In Studio Ghibli’s The Red Turtle, a red turtle repeatedly prevents the castaway from leaving the island.
The film opens with a shipwrecked man trying to escape his isolated island on homemade rafts. Each attempt ends when a large red turtle destroys or overturns the raft, forcing him back to shore. The animal’s presence changes the story from a straightforward survival tale into a quiet fantasy.
The castaway later encounters the turtle in another form, and the story follows his life, family, aging, and relationship with the natural world. The film contains no spoken dialogue, so the turtle’s meaning is conveyed through movement, color, repetition, and the changing seasons.
The Red Turtle was directed by Dutch animator Michaël Dudok de Wit and produced in collaboration with Studio Ghibli, Wild Bunch, and Why Not Productions. It was released in 2016.